This invention relates to railroad flatcars used in the transportation of lading containers. The invention is specifically concerned with an anti-pilferage device which prevents unauthorized opening of the container doors when the containers are on the car.
One of the problems in designing an anti-pilferage device of the type described is the need to accommodate containers of various lengths. The flatcar units are typically designed to carry two 20-foot containers, or one 40, 45 or 48-foot container. Obviously, the placement of a barrier to opening a container door will depend on the length of the container. While it may be possible to use a single barrier for each car unit, such an arrangement would require longitudinal adjustment of its position to accommodate various container lengths. This would necessitate manual movement of the barrier, adding another step to the loading procedure. It is undesirable to add steps to the loading procedure due to the risk that such a step may be neglected or forgotten.
A second approach to providing anti-pilferage devices for multiple container lengths is to provide such devices at the 40, 45 and 48-foot positions. While this approach alleviates the need for longitudinal positioning of the anti-pilferage devices, it still requires displacement of one or more sets of devices when long containers are loaded. For example, if a 48-foot container is loaded, the anti-pilferage devices at the 45 and 40-foot locations must be retracted or otherwise moved out of their operative positions. With known barrier devices, this requires a manual retraction operation, which must be performed prior to loading a long container. As mentioned above, adding steps to the loading procedure is undesirable. Another difficulty with manual retraction of anti-pilferage devices arises when a long container is replaced by a shorter one. In that situation the previously-retracted anti-pilferage device must be moved back to its operative position.
Another problem with multiple sets of devices is that they are subject to damage during loading of containers unless they are retracted. Since the devices are necessarily closely adjacent the end of a container, they are subject to being bumped during loading and unloading operations.